Since I am always on the lookout for a great solution at a fair price, I wanted to have a look at the Kuhn couplers. While designed for TT scale, as an alternative to the Tillig coupler**, it does use the N Scale NEM 355 coupler socket. At a price of around 20 euro (21USD/27AUD) for 24 couplers these are cheaper than almost any other coupler. What interested me is that these are fairly slim looking and have a metal hook which may open it up to (electro)magnetic decoupling. This is the one thing I haven’t tried it yet – but I’ll update this when I do.
** in fact, it's extremely similar in design to the Tillig TT coupler
Restarting this model railroad hobby is quite a search as to which things will work for me, are cost effective, and don’t give too many headaches. So here’s my findings around the DCC decoders & turnout controls.
Turnout controls.
Cobalt Digital IP turnout motor with a Peco 55 Curved Turnout stuck on top.
Quite early on I found an Australian company, DCC Concepts, offering an attractive range of products. One of the things I tried and am really pleased with are their Cobalt Digital IP turnout motors. They draw very little current (~5mA idle, up to 60mA when in use) so they could be fed from your expensive DCC source. The build-in DCC decoder is very easy to setup.
This cobalts are also reasonably compact* for this slow-throw type, come with screws, mounting foam, easy wiring terminals and do the polarity switch well. And while fuly digital, still allows panel switches and LEDs! That all made me stop looking at servo or solenoid based solutions! All in one that just works and with little wiring will do just fine – even if it is at a small premium. Still there might be need for other types in spaces that do not have the clearance. A tip for when planning a multiple level layout, make sure to route your tracks away from where these sit above, or make sure you have the ~70mm extra clearance.
Easy wiring…
A great plain-English turnout/cross over/double slip wiring manual, using the Cobalt, can be found here on the gaugemaster.com website. It’s the best guide I’ve seen and it’s not just for Cobalts either.
* maximum dimensions including terminal, bits for mounting : 39x53x66mm (width,length, depth)
N Scale decoders
On to these little gems. Yes, we N Scalers don’t want much.. just everything but then small 🙂
Having worked with 3 decoders now and wishing to keep it to 1 species as much as possible (so I can just remember one manual), I’ve been looking at many options – and more trials are on the way. Now, there are different decoders for different people, it really depends on your wishes & priorities – rather than that one is just bad or good. So for me these are the priorities (feel free to borrow very selectively):
Must have complete documentation that is efficient to use
Must have very good low speed (crawling) driving characteristics (not toy like) and speed changes must look good
Usually already required with point 2: adjustable back-EMF
Continues after micro power interruptions
Allow programming / reading values on main (Railcom)
Enough features to speed match for double traction
1 or 2 extra, powered, ports for things like DMU/EMUs interior lights.
Allow individual function mapping for lights & light effects such as dimming.
Affordable and available. Having a function decoder (affordable) with compatible light effects helps keep the price down: would you like it if engine end dims nicely and the steering end doesn’t ?
Prefer to have DC signal-braking with adjustable breaking (as option for later)
The little Kühn that could.
Three decoders I tried this far (on 2 different locos each) are all NEM 651 since the locomotives that I run all have it:
(1) Kühn 45. After adjusting the back-EMF, my locomotives drive and crawl very smoothly. It’s not expensive. It has 2 extra ports + SUSI. It has very well written documentation – easy to look things up (if you can read German, if not the Kuhn 25 manual is in English). The negatives: Lacks accurate speed curve adjustment – not sure why they don’t allow the 28 step-speed setup to work in 128 step mode. Limited braking options for DC signal breaking. Just basic effects & function mapping. Conclusion: If you can do without some features, this a great budget option – it does all basic things well and has 2/4 extra ports. Easily available online from most larger model railroad shops in Germany.
(2) ESU Lokpilot v4 Micro. This one worked and drove brilliantly straight out of the box. The decoder has an unmatched feature-set as far as configurability for anything from lighting/effects, constant breaking distance to 4 parameter engine control.. The documentation on this one is complete, but not easy to use. And unfortunately the 2 extra ports are not amplified – I think they try to sell their expensive function boards + energy storage + programming tool on top of the decoder – which is already in the top price bracket. There’s also no V4 function decoder. Conclusion: Top dog so far – driving and feature wise but I really miss the 2 powered ports and matching function decoder. It’s also definitely the PC of decoder manuals in Mac vs PC. For the rest, I am impressed.
*Update 11 Mar 2015: after entering the recommended presets from the manual for the Fleischmann round motor, the speed control and minimum speed (1mm per 3 seconds or so) has dramatically improved and is now a whole class ahead of the Kuhn.
(3) DCC Concepts Zen. This decoder is more targeted at HO/OO scale locomotives with very little space and for people who just want an affordable decoder to work out of the box rather than extensive configurability. Hardly ticks boxes for me (horses for courses), but it does come standard with a compact stay-alive!
Zen Decoder and Stay-Alive pack fit snugly in the Fleischmann VT 12.5 DMU. It got replaced by the ESU Lok Pilot later.
Other decoders that have/are being considered:
– Lenz Silver+/Gold+ mini (no advantages over ESU)
– DZ126T from Digitrax (out of contention too)
– Doehler & Haas’ D&H10C (may still be an option – priced as Kuhn but with limited documentation)
– CT Elektronik decoders (likely to have a closer look at these)
– Zimo decoders
Hopefully arriving soon will be the ZIMO MX622 which I finally managed to source for a good price from Germany – it seems to tick all the boxes at a price below the ESU and may just offer firmware updating without an expensive programming tool using my Z21 too.
This book gets mentioned more than about any other book regarding designing model railroads. Written in a time (the first edition being 1963) well before smartphone, dcc – how relevant is this book still? How much would I enjoy reading this with my Euro centric focus – you know, with in the back of my mind seeing Americans on youtube walking along massive layouts, manually shunting away? It was time to check it out!
Having read it now (some hours later) – none of the praises for it are misplaced. I find it an invaluable book, and likely for anyone with some interest in planning a model railroad. So why? Well, it was obviously written by someone who build and designed quite a few layouts and for very different purposes. The author, John Armstrong is very organised in digesting both the real thing and layout design, so he has brilliantly categorised and characterised different types of layouts and different types of railway operation. It reads well, it is very clearly illustrated. The author also shares his ‘squares’ design method and while not discussed at length – its enough to get it and apply it.
Some of the highlights for me:
Several of John’s ideas around yard/track design to make sure tracks get double functions to save space & costs such as the idea depicted here with a clever use of the turntable where the service exit track also functions as a supply track.
My mockup – not an actual picture from the book
The pros, cons and suitability for individuals, clubs for each type of layout: the point to loop, loop to loop, doglegs…
Many, many great diagrams
The clever reverting loop
The fact he goes into both passenger traffic and goods / shunting operations and the shifts that occurred over time
In the end, the ideas presented in this book are near timeless, brilliantly well presented and there are some real eye-openers. It gives great guidance on the basic design of a model railroad and how to go about it to be successful. It’s not very expensive either so I can really recommend to anyone.
Reviewed: Track Planning for Realistic Operation by John Armstrong
After having had the Black Z21 for about two weeks and testing it, here’s some of my experiences with it. It’s one part review, and one part hints & tips – especially the bits that you may not find elsewhere.
What’s in the box?
The Z21 comes in a pretty nice looking, shiny box with the Z21, a WIFI router, power supplies, power cables and a manual in a couple of languages. And that’s it. The Z21 looks like this:
Black Z21 with iPad mini and Z21 app running, showing the functions on the left, speed control on the right and loc selection at the bottom. One the right you can switch to controlling turnouts and other accessories. The light on the front can be blue, flickering blue (emergency stop/voltage off), green (programming) or flickering red (short circuit). Plenty of connections on the back.
Setting it up using existing WIFI router
First of all the power cables had continental European style plugs, so I had to find an adapter – luckily I had two in my box of cables & connectors. And a network cable (also not included). Having thought about the WIFI setup, I wanted to go with my existing WIFI network, so that my mobile and tablet did not need to change network to access the Z21. Having seen questions online I knew people had issues with that and finding documentation was a bit of a challenge. In fact that failed.
However, the issue with getting your own router working is quite simple. I think most home routers only ‘see’ devices in their own 256-address range. My Belkin was set up with 192.168.1.xxx range. The Z21 is setup on address 192.168.0.111 (see sticker on the bottom) – and hence invisible. By changing the IP address of the router from 192.168.1.254 to 192.168.0.254 – that was all solved.
The free Z21 app then immediately found the Z21, the programming track worked, the main track worked. All systems were go.
Definite Pros
– Lots of connectors and inter-brand compatibility (see this PDF from Roco) – Being able to read & program CVs on the main.
– Being able to program CVs with my mobile, then immediately trial with a 2nd device.
– Excellent visualisation and control of locs and accessories. Easy setup.
– Additional router still handy if you have a modular layout and want to use it somewhere else.
– Immediate updates on all controllers when one makes a change.
– Total freedom to walk around.
– Being able to add multiple mobiles (more easily available than dcc controllers)
– Ability to see current consumption, set track voltage from the app!
– Regular firmware updates with more settings & more functionality
– Easy to setup routes where several items get set in timed manner
– Quick short detection & recovery, status clearly visible
The Not So Good – Some things can only be configured by a free, but PC-only setup program – Accessories like the DCC Concepts Cobalt IP Digital point motors, have a special function address on address 197,198,199 and you will need to create a dummy switch on a layout to program them. It easy enough, but there no direct way of programming accessories, as there is for locomotives. Also note that by default (you can change that) on the Z21 you will find such pre-programmed addresses at +4 the address that is specified: I got those point motor working using addresses 201,202 and 203.
– Ipad app seems less responsive then iPhone app, haven’t tried Android yet.
The bad – None really, but not being able to transfer/share the entire controller setup to another mobile is a miss (did not find it at least – only layouts can be imported/exported).
Early conclusion
While I don’t have a full scale layout and haven’t tried everything yet, I really like this system. I feel good about the choices they made and it is all quite intuitive – a very good characteristic to me. Mobile & tablet touch control works very well. And while it’s a reasonable new system, its already decently polished. It’s also pretty well priced (at least where I bought it). The next step will be to try out the loconet block detection and loconet I/O and see how easy that goes.
If you’re in Australia, I can recommend buying it from DCC Concepts (no relation). They have it for a good price, ship quickly and have a range of other great products it seems (point motors with built-in decoders for one!), but also advice manuals on things like how to make a good choice of DCC system.
N-Scale Blog 